


i wish we had more time

by mourntheknight



Category: The Maze Runner (Movies), The Maze Runner Series - All Media Types, The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-06
Updated: 2018-02-06
Packaged: 2019-03-14 12:24:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13590000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mourntheknight/pseuds/mourntheknight
Summary: "I'm not going to kill you—that's my uncle's job."Prompt by: minhoismazerunner on tumblrEveryone knows Minho is the son of the leader of the Runners, even his best friend Newt. But then Minho gets kidnapped by their rival gang, who keeps asking about their leader's son, who, of course, Minho knows nothing about. So why are they so insistent that Minho knows him?





	i wish we had more time

**Author's Note:**

> Heads up! This isn't really gory but it is still a kind of a mafia AU. (but if you've read/watched tmr you'll be fine this isn't worse than that the worst it gets is a few cuts)  
> title credit: wonder woman  
> Enjoy!!

The first thing he hears is the drip, drip, drip of water from a leaky pipe.

Cliché.

He can’t see anything, no doubt due to the blindfold over his eyes and the bag over his head. Overkill, but he understands why they’d want to take that precaution.

He can feel the zip ties under the rope binding his wrists and ankles together to the chair. Again, completely unnecessary, but he can’t help but feel a little honoured that they’re being this careful.

Then again, they had to be to have gotten this far. He’s been trained for this, after all. The fact that they managed to surprise him is impressive enough. That, or he’s losing his touch. He can hardly be blamed for that, though. It’s been years since stuff like this happened to him.

His head is throbbing, and he feels a little dizzy and nauseous, but the sensation is unfamiliar to him. They must’ve come up with some way to knock him out that didn’t involve a strong hit to the back of the head.

Lying still, he tries to evaluate his options. They’ve taken his phone, of course, and anything that he could possibly use to escape. He’s about to try to break the zip ties when he hears muffled footsteps approaching. Two? Three? It’s difficult to tell. He’s still feeling a little woozy in the head, and the lack of ability to see is not helping his ability to gauge whether he has a concussion or not.

He hears the click of a lock and the creak of the door handle, and slumps back in his chair, relaxing his muscles, his head lolling to one side. He doesn’t want them to realise that he is awake just yet.

“—oing to teach you how to deal with people who tend to… disagree with us,” a nasally voice sounds out from behind the door.

He hears someone mutter a reply, too faint for him to make out any of the words, before he hears the sound of rusty hinges swinging open. He winces, and wants to tell someone to oil the damn thing, but he thinks that the cloth stuffed in his mouth might hinder that process a little.

“Are we going to torture ’im, boss?” An eager, gruff voice asks from behind him.

“Yes,” the nasally voice, the one that belongs to the boss, answers.

“Are you going to kill him?” A new voice, a quiet voice comes from his left.

“Yes,” The boss replies again.

“Janson’s going to give us a demonstration,” the gruff voice says eagerly.

Janson. He knows that name. His father told him to beware the name. Janson, the butcher of the Flare family. Brother, not by blood but by bond, to the head of the Flare family, Ava Paige. The one his family knows as Rat Man.

Several thoughts enter his mind at once. One, that he can really see why Janson has been given the name Rat Man. Even his voice sounds like something that would emit from a slimy sewer rat. Two, that it is in fact the family’s rivals that are behind this. Once again, he is being dragged back into this life, despite having left it months ago. Three, that he isn’t going to leave this place alive. The Butcher, cliché as it sounds, pretty much sums up everything one needs to know about his job description. He’s seen the bodies that have come out of that place. People from his family, well, what was left of them, anyway, after they’d been through his hands. A burning hatred for the man he cannot see suddenly courses through his veins, and he forces himself to remain still instead of struggling against his restraints.

“Are you going to wake ’im up?”  The gruff voice asks.

“No, he’s already awake,” Rat Man says, confidently and calmly, and the next words he hears are said directly into his ear. “Aren’t you, _boy_?” He feels a chill run through his bones, and a sense of dread settles in his stomach.

“Who is he? What did he do?” The quiet voice pipes up, still in the same place as before, still full of questions.

“He’s one of the Runners. In fact,” Rat Man continues, somewhat gleefully, “I think you know this one.”

Know him? He hardly knows anyone on the other side, unless punching a few of them in the face counts as a valid introduction. But he left that behind a long time ago.

He hardly has time to think before the bag is roughly yanked off his head, and he hears a sharp intake of breath coming from somewhere to his right.

“Minho?” The quiet voice asks in disbelief.

All of a sudden, his mind goes blank. Because although he can’t see who it is, he knows that voice. Oh god, he _knows that voice_.

\----------

It was sometime before he turned sixteen? No, seventeen.

He was still a part of his father’s gang then, constantly getting into fights in school. Everyone knew him as _that_ mafia boss’ son. It was like something out of a badly scripted television show. But Minho was sixteen, and he didn’t stop to think twice about what his family was doing, about what he was doing, _why_ he was doing it… thinking back on it now, the lack of thought that went on in his sixteen-year-old mind somewhat astounds him.

He was walking out of school, after everyone else had gone home, when he heard the tell-tale sound of a blow to the stomach, followed by a sharp yelp coming from the basketball courts. Probably some kid getting beaten up for no reason. Looking back on it now, maybe he should’ve just walked past. Perhaps he wouldn’t be tied to a chair and fearing for his life right now. Then again, he should have done a lot of things.

He would’ve had to walk by the courts anyway, or else he might not even have stopped. But it was five against one, and the kid was on the ground, struggling to sit up, and, _god_ , if he weren’t so predictable, maybe he wouldn’t have landed in this mess.

He probably yelled something corny, like, “pick on someone your own size!” Or something along the lines of that. Sixteen-year-olds did stupid things like that.

But other sixteen-year-olds were equally as foolish, and the first one decided to turn his rage on Minho, yelling something unintelligible as he charged towards him. If this was anything like a badly written television show, Minho would have beat up the bullies without a single scratch. Too bad that it was real life.

He’d been trained to fight, but five against one was still five against one, and it ended with a messy cut across Minho’s cheek from a sloppy punch thrown by the third guy and numerous blows to the rest of his body that was sure to result in many a bruise the next day.

He was too busy chasing them away to pay much attention to the boy they had been about to attack. The boy remained sat on the ground, blond hair messed up from when he’d been pushed to the ground, dark brown eyes wide as he watched, in awe of the boy that fought so valiantly to protect him.

The bullies left, in the end. Decided it wasn’t worth it to go through one kid to beat up the other. Or, they figured out who Minho was, and decided to leg it back to whatever hole they’d crawled out of.

Minho extended one hand to the boy, while wiping the blood off his nose with the other. “Hey, I’m Minho. Need a hand?” He asked, feeling somewhat proud that he had vanquished the evil that had plagued this boy. That was back when he used to be proud of winning fights with his fists.

The boy rushed to accept his offer, grabbing onto his hand as if he was drowning at sea and it was the only life preserver.

“Who are you?” Minho asked curiously.

The boy looked somewhat affronted at that. “What do you—what do you mean, who am I? I’m in two of your classes!”

“Uh, are you sure?”

“We just had Biology this morning and Chemistry the day before,” the boy said with a deadpan expression.

“Shit, really?” Minho quickly tried to cover up his mistake. “I must’ve taken a hit to the back of my head in that fight to save your life that made me lose my memory?” He replied sheepishly.

“My knight in shining armour,” the boy drawled. “Come on, let’s get you patched up. The nurse’s office will be closed by now, but I think they keep a first aid kit in Biology.”

“Thanks.” A pause. “I’m Minho, by the way.”

“You already said that. Maybe you really do have a concussion.”

“Your sarcasm is giving me a concussion.”

After that, they both fell silent, the only noise being the sound of their footsteps as they made their way to the classroom.

“Newt.”

“Huh?”

“You asked who I was. I’m Newt.”

“Oh. Cool.”

Silence.

“I’m Minho.”

“Oh my god.”

“I like it,” Minho mused. “Newt.”

\----------

 _Newt_.

It comes as a surprise to him that he didn’t recognise his voice sooner. Maybe it’s because it is so much softer, so much more compliant than he is used to. He hates it. But it’s not the first thought that runs through his head. The first is _what is Newt doing here_ followed quickly by the realisation that Newt knows Janson. The Butcher. Of the Flare family. _How—_

Before he can dwell on that any further, the cloth is yanked from his mouth, and he is given the ability to speak again.

“Now,” Rat Man commands, interrupting whatever Minho is going to say, “you’re going to tell us why you were talking to the head of the Flare’s son.”

Now, Minho is even more confused, and the fact that he still can’t see isn’t helping.

“I haven’t been talking to anyone,” he says slowly, as if Rat Man is unable to comprehend basic sentences. (Well, Minho wouldn’t put it past him.) “I’m not even part of the Runners anymore, so why am I here?”

The one with the gruff voice growls. “You’ve been talking to him, boy! We’ve seen—”

“Ahem,” Janson cuts in with his nasally voice. “We understand that you’ve been sticking your nose in our business. If you were a regular person, we’d chase you off and you’d be on your way. But when a _Runner_ interferes with our affairs, that is when it becomes… unacceptable.”

“You’re not listening to me. I told you, I’m not with them anymore.” Minho repeats through gritted teeth.

\----------

There was something about sitting alone in a classroom with only one other person that seemed… cosy. Maybe it was that the room was meant for thirty screaming children, not two boys, sitting in awkward silence, one trying to patch up the other after said other had gotten into a fight for him. It was like something out of an Indiana Jones movie.

“So, oh brave saviour, why did come to my rescue?” Newt asked, eyes fixed on the antiseptic cream he was dabbing onto Minho’s cut.

“Well, you know me. Always getting into fights,” Minho joked, punching the air in front of him.

“Stay still,” Newt hissed. “And I would’ve thought that the heir to the Runners would have his own after-school fight to handle.”

“Five versus one, though? Come on, you know that wasn’t fair.”

“So, the son of the head of the mafia believes in _fair_?”

“Okay, now _that’s_ not fair,” Minho huffed.

Newt fished out a handful of plasters before reaching deep into the first aid kit, hunting for something. “Anyway, I had it under control.”

“Sure,” Minho said doubtfully, raising an eyebrow. “You had it under so much control.”

“I’m more capable than I look, you know.”

Minho took a good long look at Newt, noticing the lean muscle on his arms and legs.

“Minho.” Newt grinned, and snapped his fingers to get his attention. “You’ve got to take me out to dinner first before you do that.”

“Hey, I just saved your life! Shouldn’t _you_ be buying _me_ dinner?”

“Ah, my brave knight, so noble, so chivalrous.”

“I resent that.”

“Well we can always—aha!” Newt cried out triumphantly, as he yanked out a plaster from the bottom of the box.

Peering closely at the plaster, he could see a cartoon boy with a big arrow on his forehead, and an equally big smile plastered all over his face, holding up a peace sign.

Minho looked at him in disbelief. “Avatar? Seriously? Why can’t you use one of the normal ones?”

“Because,” Newt answered, pasting it onto a nasty cut on his forearm, “I have good taste.”

“Your taste is questionable at best.”

“What, you don’t like Avatar? I used to watch it with my sister all the time. Plus, I think he looks a little like you.”

“This guy is bald. I have great hair. You could’ve given me season three Zuko at least.”

“Anyway, he stands for peace and all that shit,” Newt explained, moving on to the next open wound. “Just something someone from the mafia needs.”

“Alright, Mr. High and Mighty, I don’t love it either,” Minho snarked back. “I’d leave if I could. I was just born into it, okay? You don’t know what it’s like.”

\----------

Something cold and sharp presses against his collarbone. “Once a Runner, always a Runner, and you’re going to tell us what you know,” Rat Man snarls into his ear, “or I’ll be sending you back to your father piece by piece.”

“I don’t know anything,” Minho says, and hisses when the blade nicks his flesh.

“The boss is very protective of her heir,” the Butcher tells him, grinning as he leaves a mark on his skin. “I’m afraid that won’t suffice.”

“I don’t know who this heir is!” Minho exclaims, still in disbelief that he’s being kidnapped over a mistake.

He thinks he can hear a soft noise of concern coming from Newt, and he doesn’t understand why Newt is just _standing there_. If their positions were switched, Minho would’ve killed everyone else in the room by now, and Newt would be safe.

“Yes, you do,” Janson sings out, making another mark, this time on his left arm, and much deeper.

“Stop, please,” he hears Newt’s voice again, slightly louder this time, but not loud enough to break Janson’s concentration as he focuses on his victim. To hear Newt’s voice mixed with the violence he so despised seems… wrong, somehow.

“Newt, tell him, please,” Minho says with a barely even tone, because he does not beg, because he has been trained never to beg for his life.

“See, you do know him!” Janson cries out.

And before Minho can fully process this, Newt speaks out once again, voice clearer than before. “No, he doesn’t, uncle.”

Suddenly, everything falls into place, and Minho _understands_. Why Newt is here. Why the Butcher is so sure that he talks to this heir. Why Newt calls Rat Man, brother to Ava Paige, the leader of the Flare, his _uncle_.

“You.” He spits out. “It’s you. You’re the heir.”

His heart hurts, hurts more than any of the cuts that have sliced through his skin, more than any of the kicks or punches he’s gotten in fights, hurts more than any bone he’s ever broken.

He thinks he imagines Newt’s soft voice whisper, “sorry.”

\----------

“So, I was thinking,” Newt said, appearing by his side the next day before classes started. “Have you ever killed anyone?”

“Good morning to you too, sunshine,” Minho greeted.

“Wait, have you actually?”

Minho rolled his eyes. “You know I—"

“Of course, if you answered that, then it’d be a confession and then you’d have to go to jail,” Newt interrupted, furrowing his eyebrows.

“Only if you ratted me out,” Minho responded, stopping at his locker to gather his books.

Newt snorted at that. “Don’t worry, darling. I’m good at keeping secrets.”

\----------

“I should have known.” Minho says with a low, bitter laugh.

The blade is removed, and he no longer feels the cold metal touching his skin.

“So, you really didn’t know.” Janson sounds surprised. “He really didn’t know?”

He doesn’t hear a reply, so he assumes Newt is giving a non-verbal confirmation, but all he wants is to hear his voice again. To hear Newt say that it isn’t him. That he has no part to play in all of this. But there is only silence, with the constant dripping of water from the pipes.

“Now will you let me go?” He asks through gritted teeth, although he knows that it is too much to hope for.

The man with the gruff voice laughs, and he takes that as an indication to start fearing for his life again. Especially when the knife is back, this time pressed to his throat.

“All the same, whether you knew or not,” the Butcher says smoothly, “you are a Runner, the son of their precious leader, in fact, and we could always use… valuable information.”

“Uncle, this is unnecessary,” he hears Newt mutter.

“Are you going soft, nephew? I think you’ve spent too much time at that school of yours, with this boy. You’ve forgotten how things work around here,” Janson sneers.

Minho tenses his muscles, waiting for the next cut, but it never comes. Instead, he hears Newt quickly walk over to his uncle, which is soon followed by whispering and footsteps as his kidnappers make their way out of the room.

There is an unbearable silence that stretches on for minutes that seem like hours. He listens for their footsteps so intently that whenever he hears the dripping of water from the pipe, he jumps a little. The next time someone walks in, they could have the intent to murder. He tries to hope that Newt would stick up for him, _is_ sticking up for him, but he doesn’t have high hopes. After all, does the Newt he knows really exist? Perhaps he was asking Rat Man to give him a swift death instead.

The door swings open on its rusty hinges, and once again, he winces. He prays to some unknown deity that it won’t be the last thing he hears. One set of footsteps enter the room.

The Butcher has come to kill him after all.

A chill goes through his veins. In a few seconds, he will be dead. Forever. He’ll never leave this room. God, what a dismal place to die in.

The person stops right in front of him and grabs the back of his chair, leaning over so he can feel the person’s hot breath on his ear.

“Minho.” The voice is low and urgent, and most importantly, it belongs to Newt.

\----------

A ball of crumpled up paper landed on Newt’s desk in Chemistry.

 _Hey_ , the note read. _Want to study in the library after school? We have that Bio test in a week._

Newt scribbled a hasty reply before tossing it in the original sender’s direction.

_Sure. No violence scheduled after the three o’clock bell? I’m shocked._

The boy sitting next to him, Toby something or other, passes it back to him within the short time span of forty seconds.

_Don’t be. We’ll be hitting the books._

Newt groaned internally, and spent the next twenty minutes of Chemistry staring at the clock, wishing for class to end. The second he heard the shrill bell, both he and Minho were out of their seats and on their way to the library.

“Do you even study?” Newt asked him sceptically. “I thought you spent most of your time running around and picking fights.”

Minho put a hand on his chest and made an exaggeration expression. “I’m insulted! We’ve known each other for months now, and you don’t think I study? Who do you think beats you in English and Biology every year?”

“That’s you?! You’re the one who ruined my perfect streak!” Newt exclaims, running a hand through his hair. “I always thought it was Teresa.”

“Nah, but I heard she’s pretty decent in History or something.”

“Oh my god, I am so beating you in that next test.”

“Aim high, hit low, dude,” Minho said. “Study for an hour then quiz each other?”

“You’re on. I’ll kick your butt.”

Minho smirked. “Please.”

“I’m pretty decent in a fight, you know,” Newt replied casually, picking at a loose thread on his jacket.

Minho swung his arm around Newt’s shoulder. “You wouldn’t last five minutes in my world, my friend.”

\----------

“Minho. Listen. I have to be quick; they’re right outside and Janson’s only given me five minutes.” Newt explains urgently.

Minho knows that the sensible thing to do right now would be to listen carefully, but he’s still torn between the pain of betrayal and the relief that it was Newt that came back for him and the constant fear that he’s about to die, and he doesn’t know what to think.

“I’m trying to h—”

“How could you _lie_?” Minho asks, cutting in, voice as sharp as the blade that cut his skin.

“Look, I don’t have time—”

 _Make time!_ He wants to yell, and it takes every ounce of his strength to keep himself under control. “Surely you can do whatever you want. After all, you’re the _heir_ , aren’t you?” He laughs bitterly.

“I’m sorry,” Newt apologises, voice sounding sincere. Then again, it had always sounded sincere to Minho, but maybe even that had been a lie. “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, but later. All you need to know is that I’m sorry, and I’ll try to delay them for as long as I can.”

“Does it matter? I’m going to die anyway. Why do you even _care_?” Minho hisses.

“Look, I—”

The door bangs open, and Rat Man slimy voice rings out like he’s announcing a death sentence. “Time’s up, nephew!”

“But, uncle, I—” He can hear the panic in Newt’s voice.

Another voice, a new voice, sounds out, “Janson! The director wants a word.” It belongs to a woman, her accent eerily similar to Newt’s.

“Alright,” Janson reluctantly agrees. “Nephew, watch the boy. I’ll be back to deal with him soon.”

“Yes, uncle.”

“You, stand outside and guard the door.” Janson commands. “No one comes in or out of this room until I get back.”

“Yes, boss,” the gruff voice replies.

The door swings shut, making the same god-awful screech, leaving the two of them alone in the room that is suddenly filled with loud silence.

\----------

“Psst! Newt!” Minho quietly called out from across the library table.

The boy looked up from his work, one eyebrow raised. “Yes, Minho?”

“What’s the name of that thing where the embryo attaches in the fallopian tubes?”

“Ectopic pregnancy?”

Minho eyes lit up as he made a note of it, flashing Newt a quick thumbs-up.

“Looks like someone needs to brush up on their reproductive biology,” Newt joked.

Minho grinned like the cat that caught the canary. “Why? You offering?”

Newt’s cheeks turned a lovely shade of pink as he looked back down at his work. “Shut up.”

“You suggested it.”

“Did not.”

“Did too.”

“Did not.”

The librarian at the counter cleared her throat loudly, staring at them rather pointedly, so they quietly turned back to their books lest they invoke the wrath of the librarian.

However, it wasn’t five minutes later before Newt stretched out his foot to tap Minho gently on his foot.

“If you wanted to play footsie, all you had to do was ask,” Minho whispered quietly with a cheeky grin.

“No, you boob. Do you want to go watch the new Star Wars movie with me after the test? I haven’t seen it yet, but I don’t know anyone else who wants to watch it.”

“And you thought of me? How sweet.” Minho beamed.

Newt narrowed his eyes at Minho in a feeble attempt to glare at him. “So?”

“It’s a date.”

\----------

Minho can feel Newt’s nimble fingers fiddling with the too-tight blindfold, loosening it till it drops around his neck, and suddenly, he’s looking at white light. He immediately shuts his eyes again, and has to blink a couple of times before his eyes are used to the brightness.

It’s a larger room than he thought it would be, and brighter, too, almost too bright, especially since he expected a dingy old basement. There is a distinct lack of furniture apart from the chair Minho is tied to, and he knows that this is to facilitate a smoother and faster clean-up after the Butcher has been let loose to do as he pleases. He can still see the bloodstains between the tiles. He tries not to think about how he could be next.

The ceiling, walls and floor are all white, impractical, but it screams of the Butcher’s horrific taste. The crimson red of spilled blood would stand out against the white. He takes into account the position of the door, and how far away it is from him, planning an escape route in his head. Granted, since he doesn’t know the way outside of this room, his escape route isn’t very well thought out, but he’ll deal with that when he gets to it. First, he has to think about whether he can even get out of this chair.

The water that has been dripping down has created a small puddle in the corner of the room, not far from Minho, and it is a wonder that no one has fixed it yet, although it is possibly there on purpose, the constant steady drip of water meant to drive the Butcher’s victim insane while they wait to be tortured. It’s certainly working on him.

“—inho! Hey!”

He slowly realises that while he has been deep in thought, Newt has been calling his name, trying to get his attention.

He turns his head to look at Newt, who is staring at him with those big brown eyes, full of concern and worry.

“Are you alright?” Newt asks hurriedly.

Minho looks down at the cuts in his flesh, still bleeding through his shirt, and looks incredulously at Newt. “Do I _look_ alright?”

“You’ve always looked more than alright to me,” Newt jokes weakly, trying his best to smile but settling into something more resembling a grimace. Then, he shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I… I’m going to do everything I can to…” He trails off, unsure of what to say. To _what_? Disobey his uncle? Delay the inevitable? Impossible. There is no way he can stop this.

“Stop it.”

“What?” Newt asks, bewildered.

“Stop pretending.” Minho spits out. “Stop pretending you _care_.”

“Minho, I didn’t know—”

“Yes, you did.”

“I—”

“You knew, and you never said a word, not for years! You knew right from the start! Were you even ever my friend? Were you lying this whole time?” Minho is close to yelling, and he can feel the tears threatening to spill over. They were friends, best friends, and even more on Minho’s part, and all of it was a lie.

“No, I wasn’t…” Newt trails off, suddenly unable to think of a reason for anything he did. Why didn’t he just tell him? Perhaps it was the fear that Minho would have stopped being his friend. Or perhaps it was just pure cowardice. Either way, staring at the boy in front of him now, he can’t seem to find a way to put it into words.

“Just stop.” Minho says, swallowing hard, and trying not to cry. He doesn’t want Newt to see him cry. “Please.”

Not for the first time, Newt wishes with all his heart that they weren’t on different sides. There’s something so Shakespearean about it that he almost wants to laugh, but it’s a mad sort of laughter that verges on hysteria. He doesn’t know what to do.

Minho watches him carefully. His Minho would never have done that. His Minho would have followed him to the ends of the Earth and back. Then again, Newt isn’t supposed to be part of his rival gang either. Whatever trust Minho had for Newt must be long gone by now.

“I’m sorry. You don’t have to forgive me,” Newt hears himself say, his heart thumping loudly in his chest. He privately thinks that he might die if Minho doesn’t actually forgive him. But that is his fault, after all. “I don’t know what I can do to get you out of here, but I’ll make sure that at the very least, you won’t suffer.”

“Great. That’s helpful,” Minho replies, shaking voice still managing to drip with sarcasm. “So, what then? Kill me?”

“No,” Newt says bitterly. “I’m not going to kill you. That’s my uncle’s job.”

“And you’re just going to let that happen,” Minho adds. Not a question, but a statement. He knows the family commitment. After all, he used to belong to one.

\----------

Minho sat there awkwardly, sneaking glances at Newt. The sheer fury written on the other boy’s face was the most terrifying thing he’d seen in a while. But no matter how angry Newt was, the hands wiping away the blood from Minho’s arm were steady and gentle.

It had been a particularly bad fight, as it had been against one of the kids whose parents were part of the Flare, the group rivalling the Runners. It had only ended when Newt had intervened, shoving the kids off each other, and earning a nasty scratch on his arm. It had been the other kid who’d dealt the blow. If Minho had done it by accident, he didn’t know how he would ever forgive himself for that.

The other kid, Ben something or other, had looked surprised, and backed off immediately, muttering something under his breath.

Newt hadn’t said a word since.

He cleared his throat. “Newt, I—”

“Why do you keep doing this?!” Newt exclaimed in frustration.

“What?” Minho asked, taken aback by the sudden outburst.

“Why do you keep fighting and getting injured? What if you hadn’t won that one? Will it ever stop? What if one day you don’t come to school because you’re lying dead in a ditch somewhere because you _won’t fucking stop fighting_?”

The deathly silence that fell was louder than Newt’s outburst. His hand gripped the bloody towel so hard his knuckles were white. Newt had taken to carrying one in his pocket after cleaning up Minho’s injuries day after day after day. Since that first day, there had always been a handkerchief or cloth stuffed deep inside his pocket, along with plasters and antiseptic cream. It occurs to Minho that he wasn’t the only person that was getting hurt by all the fighting, and it dawned on him exactly how incredibly _dense_ he was being.

“I’ll stop.”

“And, for that matter, you never even think about—wait what?” Newt asked, clearly not expecting that response.

“I’ll stop fighting.”

“Really?” Newt asked incredulously, fingers fumbling as he wiped away the last of the blood.

“Yeah. I guess you won’t be needing that anymore,” Minho said, gesturing to the cloth.

“I… yeah.”

\----------

Newt looks over at the cuts on Minho’s skin, and suddenly he can’t stand it one moment further. He reaches into his pockets, a habit formed after years of tending to his friend’s wounds, and brings out a cloth.

Minho’s eyes widen. “You still…”

“Of course,” Newt answers softly but matter-of-factly.

He reaches out to Minho, and tries not to focus on the ache in his heart when his friend automatically leans into it, but flinches away at the last second.

It shows on his face, however, and Minho’s initial instinct is to comfort him. In that split second, he forgets the lies, the deceit, everything. He takes a good long look at Newt, at how he is fidgeting on the spot, at how he can’t look him in the eye and is busy staring at all of Minho’s cuts and bruises and scars, at how he genuinely looks so upset with himself, and he realises that perhaps it wasn’t all an act.

Despite all of this, Minho can’t stand the fact that he is part of the reason why the boy is so miserable. “Hey, it’s okay.” The words come out of his mouth faster than his brain can process them, and he forgets that he was supposed to be angry.

“No, it’s not,” Newt says angrily, “and I can’t do a single fucking thing about it.”

“They would have taken me anyway,” he tries half-heartedly, but they both know it is a lie.

“No, they wouldn’t! If I hadn’t been your friend, or if I just hadn’t been in that fight the first time we met, or—”

“I wouldn’t have had it any other way,” Minho insists. “Well, maybe if you’d told me who you were somewhere along the way. That might have been useful.”

“You wouldn’t have been here if it wasn’t for me,” Newt says miserably.

“We can deal with semantics later. What do we do now?”

“I can’t defy my uncle or my mother,” Newt answers defeatedly, shoulders drooping. “You might as well give up.”

\----------

“I’ve thought about giving it all up,” Minho announced one day, fighting to keep his voice light and conversational. He sat on the teacher’s desk in an empty classroom, with only one other boy to keep him company. The silence in the room was overwhelming.

“What?” Newt asked, looking up from his math homework, startled.

“The Runners and all that shit.” Minho offhandedly stated, as if it wouldn’t drastically change his life if he followed through with that plan.

Newt cocked his head to the side. “Are you serious?”

“How could I let this brilliant brain go to waste? It’s not like I’d get to use it much if I end up in jail at the age of twenty. Who’s going to show your ass up?” Minho joked. Then, he dropped the smile and his expression turned serious. “I’ve been thinking about universities, and… I don’t know.”

“You should apply,” Newt said firmly. “I’m going to.”

“Of course you’re going to,” Minho scoffs. “You don’t have parents that want you to inherit the dubious family business.”

Newt fell silent, contemplating before uttering the words. “Apply with me.”

“You what now?”

“Apply with me,” Newt repeated, eyes brightening, as he grabbed Minho’s hand. “We can help each other out with essays and list the school as the address, so if you’ve been accepted, your parents will never find out if you don’t want them to.”

Minho took a deep breath, and nodded, grip tightening around Newt’s steady hand like it was a lifeline.

\----------

Newt’s hand shakes as he wipes the last of the blood off of Minho’s arm. He has tried to clean the wounds as best he can, but the blood on Minho’s clothes are a strong reminder of what he has had to suffer as a result of Newt’s deceit.

“So, I’m just supposed to die,” Minho says. His voice is void of any emotion.

In a movie, this would be the point where the hero saves the day, and when the story ends with a happily ever after. But they are not heroes.

The reality of his situation is preventing Newt from voicing any of his thoughts. A large part of his brain is shouting at him, _help him escape!_ But a smaller, more logical part is telling him that it is useless. Minho would not be able to make it out of this building alive, and even if he did, the Flare would hunt him down. And they would know that Newt helped him escape. His own family might turn against him, and he could be cast out, or worse.

Minho thinks only of escape routes, consequences be damned. He has nothing else left to risk. It is escape or die, and the only friendly face he has seen has told him to give up. But what else can he do? He knows nothing of the building, and navigating it would be like finding his way around a maze. Even if he does find a way out, it will be almost impossible, given that this building is in enemy territory. Plus, the added fact that he was still stuck to this chair, and couldn’t ask Newt for help. He couldn’t ask Newt to betray his family. Not for him. The number of escape routes he has planned dwindles from eighteen to single digits, and finally, to none.

Brown eyes meet brown eyes as they look to each other, and they can see it in their faces. Neither thinks Minho is going to make it out of there alive.

\----------

Minho was doomed. Completely and utterly dead, and it was all Newt’s fault.

“Who the _fuck_ ,” Minho said, pacing to and fro around the basketball court, “has the right to be so hot?”

“Hmm?”

“It should be illegal,” he announced. “I’m making it illegal to be that hot. Or Cute. Or smart, or funny, or beautiful. Or nice to me.”

“What on God’s green earth are you talking about?”

This voice came from a girl sitting in the middle of the court, flipping through a History textbook.

“Newt!” Minho proclaimed, raising his arms to the sky. “Bane of my existence. Keep up, Brenda.”

Brenda rolled her eyes. “I’ve got my own shit to deal with, Minho. It’s no wonder that I haven’t noticed.”

“It’s your own fault for taking History again even though you suck at it. I’m pretty sure you aren’t supposed to pick a class just because Teresa’s taking it.”

Brenda shoved a middle finger in his direction.

“Anyway, why don’t you just ask her to tutor you? Then she’ll fall in love with you and yadda yadda yadda. The rest is history,” Minho said. Then, his face lit up. “Literally! Because you take History!”

Brenda raised her eyebrows. “Not bad. I might actually do that.”

“So, what do I do?”

“And why are you not already dating him?”

Minho’s incredibly muscled arms flailed around again. “Because he doesn’t like me that way!”

“And how do you know that if you haven’t asked him out?” Brenda asked, giving him a pointed look. “Doesn’t the whole bad boy image work for you?”

“Not with Newt! He hates all that stuff. Plus, he could be straight. The probability is very high.”

“You could always find a subtle way of asking. Like me,” Brenda said, looking proud. “I asked Teresa who her favourite singer was.”

“And?”

“It’s Hayley Kiyoko. There’s no way she’s straight.”

“I can’t do that! He’ll be able to tell!” Minho exclaimed.

She sighed. “Remind me again why you’re one of the most feared students in this school?”

“Shut up.”

“Just talk to him, dude.”

\----------

“Can we just talk?”

“What?” Newt asks, and halts in the middle of pacing up and down the length of the room, somewhat astonished at the request.

“Since we’ve established I’m going to die, we might as well talk until he comes back, right?” A small part of Minho still clings to the small chance that he could come out of this alive, but he knows that the likelihood is slim.

“Sure.”

“Who’s your favourite singer?”

“You’re asking me that now?” Newt asks, perplexed, as he leans against the wall of the room. Then, he turns to look at the wall closely, and decides against it. There is dried blood on the walls.

“Humour me.”

“I don’t really have one?” Newt replies, more of a questioning tone than a statement.

“Remind me never to listen to Brenda again.”

“Brenda? That girl Teresa likes?”

Minho’s jaw drops.

“Yeah,” Newt continues. “She’s liked her since forever. Or since she broke up with Thomas. Trust her to fall for her ex-boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend.”

“Brenda likes her too, dude. We’ve got to set them up.”

“We all got into the same university overseas. If everyone goes, I bet we could make it happen.”

They continue scheming about it for the next five minutes, before it suddenly dawns on Minho that he won’t be able to witness any of this, because he’ll be dead.

The thought must occur to Newt too, because the conversation stops mid-way, and they are left to sit in silence.

It soon becomes unbearable, and for some god forsaken reason, Minho blurts out, “I’m bi.”

“What?” Newt asks, eyes widening.

“I’m bi. Just thought you should know.”

Newt took a breath, about to say something, and stopped, the words on the tip of his tongue.

Minho continued, “I don’t know why I waited so long to tell you, but I guess imminent death brings out great courage in me.”

“Me too.”

Minho frowns. “You’re not about to die.”

“No,” Newt corrects him. “I’m bi.”

Minho stares. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“Cool.”

“Yes.”

Silence again.

“Well,” Minho says, breaking it yet again, “I mean, I’m only bi if you subscribe to the Western way of looking at sexuality, but you know, semantics.”

“Why, exactly, are you telling me this now?”

“So when I’m about to die, and I tell you ‘goodbye’, the pun won’t be lost on you.”

Newt groans. “You suck.”

“I sure do,” Minho replies, winking.

Newt buries his head in his hands. “How can you still crack jokes at a time like this? You’re going to die, for crying out loud.”

“Well, better me than you,” Minho says casually.

“What?” Newt asks in disbelief.

“What?” Minho repeats, feigning ignorance.

“Why would you even say that?”

“You know why—”

The echoing footsteps sound out again, and just like that, their time is up.

Their eyes shoot to the door, and back to each other. Each can see the panic in the other’s eyes, and Newt quickly reaches for the blindfold.

 _I’m sorry_ , Newt mouths, and the cloth is over his eyes once more.

All Minho can think about is how the last thing Newt is ever going to say to him is that he’s sorry. He didn’t even get to say goodbye.

The door swings open, the creaks filling Minho with a sense of dread as he hears Rat Man walk back into the room.

He hears the sound of Newt’s footsteps as he walks away from Minho and towards Rat Man. “Uncle.” The quiet voice is back, and he realises why it was so hard to recognise Newt’s voice in the first place. It bares no similarities to the warm, snarky Newt that he knows. This Newt seems cold, uncaring, unfeeling. But now he knows which Newt is the real one. Or at least, he really, _really_ hopes so.

“Nephew,” Rat Man acknowledges in that slimy voice that Minho has already grown to hate. “Apologies for the long absence; I had to fetch my gun.”

The next words he said were directed at Minho. “Unfortunately, something has come up, and I won’t be able to… enjoy this as much as I would have. It’ll have to be a little quicker, I’m afraid. Where would you like it? They usually go straight for the heart, but I like the gut. It takes longer.”

Minho doesn’t answer, and when he hears the sound of the gun being cocked, he feels a chill run down his spine, and he sits upright. This is it. He is going to die. He is going to die, and he _really_ doesn’t want to.

“Actually,” Rat Man says, and Minho can almost hear the wicked sneer in his voice. “I think my nephew should have the honour of doing it.”

Minho freezes.

He hears Newt’s breath catch. “Uncle—”

“After all,” Janson continues, as if Newt hadn’t interrupted. “Lizzy’s already had the pleasure, and she’s younger than you. Why, nephew, I can’t believe you haven’t had the opportunity yet! Well, no time like the present.”

“Uncle, I—”

“Here, take this.”

“But uncle, I—”

“Take the gun, nephew,” Rat Man says, voice low as an unspoken threat is issued.

Minho hears the defeat in Newt’s voice as he acquiesces, “yes, uncle.”

He hears the gun switch hands, and hears Rat Man’s footsteps as he walks to the back of the room, away from Minho and Newt, and leans against the wall to watch.

He can hear the gun shaking, trembling in Newt’s unsteady hands.

Perhaps fate is crueller than he thought after all. Having Newt, of all people, to be the person standing in front of him, about to pull the trigger, is the last thing he wants. His eyes are already closed, but he squeezes them shut in anticipation and fear. Well, at least it will be a quick death. He hopes Newt can aim well.

He wants to yell out about how the Flare can go and fuck itself, but the words seem to be stuck in his throat. Then again, those probably aren’t the best last words. What then? _I love you_? Cliché.

“I’m sorry,” Newt whispers again, and he can hear his unsteady breathing, something that only comes about when Newt is trying very hard not to cry. “Minho, I’m so, so sorry.”

Minho knows he has seconds left, and a million thoughts run through his mind, before he whispers the one thing he wants more than anything, “I wish we had more time.”

He hears Newt breathe in shakily. “Yeah, me too,” he says, and pulls the trigger.

\----------

“Ow,” Minho complained loudly.

“So, why were you fighting one of the Cranks in the parking lot this time?” Newt questioned, as he wrapped a bandage around Minho’s forearm. “I thought you’d given up the whole fighting people thing.”

They were in the History classroom this time. The Biology classroom’s first aid box’s supply was running low after the first few times Newt had patched him up.

“They started it,” Minho responded.

Newt frowned. “What did they do?”

At that, Minho pressed his lips together, and Newt took it that he wasn’t going to reply. “I’m going to find out anyway, you know. It’ll have gone around the rest of the school by tomorrow.”

Minho sighed and leaned back in his chair. “It was just stupid stuff. Apparently, they’ve been spreading rumours about…”

“About?”

“Us.” Minho announced, as if it was some big secret.

“What about us?”

“Going out.”

“Going out?”

“Dating.”

“Dating?”

“Are you going to keep repeating everything I’m saying in the form of a question?”

“Right. No. Continue.”

“I mean, they wouldn’t stop, and the rumours started from that one guy, so I went to talk to him.”

“And?”

“And he wouldn’t listen. So, I punched him in the face.”

Newt rolled his eyes. “Ever think that there may be a better solution?”

“Like?”

“Leaving it alone? There are plenty of rumours about you anyway, and they range from you smoking behind the bins every day to that one time you apparently killed 20 men with your bare hands. Why is this one so bad?”

Minho looked surprised at that. “I don’t care, Newt. But they went after you, too. That’s crossing a line.”

Newt’s mouth dropped open, before it stretched into a wide smile, and injuries be damned, he wrapped his arms around the other boy and squeezed tight.

“Hey, watch it,” Minho laughed. “I’ve been mortally wounded over here.”

“I think you can survive one hug, tough guy.” Newt let go and sat back in his chair. “The brave knight came to my rescue once again.”

“Yeah, I’m always saving your ass. When’s it going to be your turn to bust out the moves?”

\----------

The gunshot echoes throughout the room, but the bullet does not. It flies across the room and hits its target dead centre.

Minho’s entire body tenses.

The next thing he hears is a loud thump behind him.

That’s when he realises then he doesn’t feel pain anywhere.

“Newt?” He whispers in disbelief.

He hears something clatter on the floor, and suddenly the blindfold is coming off in one smooth motion.

His eyes take time to adjust again, but the first thing he sees are Newt’s brown eyes, centimetres away from his own, staring back at him. The second is the gun, lying on the floor, discarded.

“Wh—” He barely has time to open his mouth before Newt envelops him in a gigantic hug, nearly making the chair tip over.

Newt’s shoulders are shaking as he clings on to Minho. “I thought-I thought-I thought I’d have to…” Newt forces out, as he holds on to Minho for dear life, still not quite believing that he’s alive.

“Newt, my knight in shining armour, my brave saviour,” he breathes out. “Can you get me out of this chair so I can hug you properly?”

Newt takes a deep breath and releases Minho, before making swift work of the knots and zip ties binding him to the chair. As soon as he’s free, he wraps his arms around Newt, holding him close.

“You didn’t shoot me,” he says, dazed, voice muffled by Newt’s shoulder. “Thanks for not shooting me.”

Newt lets out a big laugh, too relieved to think anything else but that _Minho is safe_.

He looks around, the gravity of the situation finally cementing itself in his mind. His eyes fall on his uncle, whose body is on the ground, blood oozing out from the hole in his stomach.

Rat Man struggles to look him in the eye. “Nephew,” he spits out, spraying specks of blood on the ground. “Traitor.”

“Newt, Newt,” Minho said urgently, grabbing Newt’s shoulders and shaking them gently. “We need to get out of here.”

“Get out. You have to go. Now,” Newt hears himself say to Minho.

Minho’s eyes widen. “What about you?”

Newt stares at Rat Man, whose eyes are slowly becoming unfocused as he loses consciousness. “I’ll endure the wrath of my mother.”

Like he had so many years ago, Minho is seized by the sudden urge to protect the boy in front of him.

“No.”

“What?” Newt asks, still distracted.

“No,” Minho says, firmly. “I’m not leaving without you.”

Newt finally looks up away from Rat Man and towards Minho, and makes his decision. His hands are shaking, but there is no hesitation when he grabs Minho’s hand and says firmly, “ _run_.”

He pulls Minho towards the door and snatches up the gun on the way out. He knows that he should be regretting everything right now, that he should feel remorse over the fact that he has just shot his uncle, and that he is pretty much out of his family for good. But running with Minho is the thing that has felt the most right his whole life.

Minho lets go of his hand when they reach the door, ready to fight whoever is on the other side of the door. He nods at Newt, who yanks it open.

The corridor is empty.

Newt frowns, eyebrows furrowing. “Where is everyone?”

“Come on, let’s go!” Minho exclaims, taking Newt’s hand and running.

Newt puts extra energy into his steps and charges ahead of the Runner. “I’m the one who know this place, remember?”

“Show off,” Minho mutters, but follows him anyway, running by his side.

They round a corner, and suddenly, the barrel of a gun is pointed straight in Minho’s face.

 _Not again_ , he thinks silently.

On instinct, Newt cocks the gun and points it in the assailant’s face.

“Newt?” The voice Minho recognises as the girl who summoned Rat Man earlier says. The one with the accent eerily similar to Newt’s. It belongs to a girl with long blonde hair, and Minho takes one look at her and doesn’t know why he didn’t connect the dots earlier.

Newt’s voice is nothing but surprise when he responds, “Lizzy?”

“Put the gun down, brother,” Lizzy says.

Newt shakes his head, keeping the gun pointed squarely at her torso.

Rolling her eyes, she uncocks her gun and stows it safely back in its holster. “I’m on your side.”

Equally stunned by this remark, both boys drop their weapons, Newt his gun and Minho his fists.

Lizzy snorts. “Took you two long enough. Why do you think there were no guards anyway?”

“But-but-but how? Why?” Newt stammered.

“Didn’t uncle say that he made me do this test before you? What, do you think I just killed my best friend in cold blood?” Lizzy asks, flicking the hair out of her eyes.

Newt frowned. “What did you do?”

A radio on her hip crackles to life. _Sonya? Where are you? Have you got them yet?_

“Sonya?” Newt asks, bewildered.

“I don’t go by Lizzy outside of this family,” she says, “just like how you go by Newt.”

Minho blinks as he takes a second to absorb this new information.

“Let’s go!” Sonya calls out, already sprinting down the corridor.

Newt grabs Minho’s hand again, and they take off.

“Your name’s not Newt?” Minho exclaims in between breaths as they run up flights of stairs.

Newt laughs, finally, laughter that sounds light and free, and says, “you asked me who I was, not for my name!”

“One would usually assume that they were the same thing!”

Newt calls a question back to him. “Does it even matter?”

Minho grins, taking two steps at a time. “Not even a little.”

Sonya yanks open a door, which leads to a side street with a black van parked outside.

A head pokes out of the window, and a hand runs through her dark curls, as the driver calls out, “get in the car, losers!”

Sonya tosses herself in the passenger seat, leaving Minho and Newt to slide into the back, before the girl starts the engine and slams her foot down on the pedal.

The back of the van is roomy and spacious, with a couple of dark tinted windows, but Newt launches himself across the back to slide open the small window that leads to the front of the van. “So what did you do? How did you get your best friend out?”

“With skill and clever planning,” Sonya announces proudly.

The driver snorts loudly. “She stabbed me.”

“Only lightly!” Sonya protests. “Watch the turning.”

“There was blood!”

“There had to be blood! Otherwise how was I going to convince him that I’d stabbed you?”

“I’m Harriet,” the driver interrupts the conversation to say. “Heard you shot Janson. I’d shake your hand, but I’m kind of focused on getting away from your mother at the moment.”

“No worries,” Newt replies, still trying to process whatever his sister has just told him.

“Hey, how come you got the knife but I got the gun?” Minho calls from his seat at the back of the van.

“I got stabbed!” Harriet says again, flicking the turning signal aggressively.

“I nearly got shot!” Minho retorts.

Newt protests, “no, you didn’t!”

“I said nearly!” Minho turns to Harriet and Sonya. “He kept it going till the last second and everything.”

“It was a big decision to make!”

Minho sighs audibly. “I guess you just have a _flair_ for the dramatic.”

“I hate you,” Newt grumbles.

“All clear!” Harriet announces from the driver’s seat.

“Where are we going anyway?” Minho asks, curiosity getting the better of him.

“Airport,” Sonya states, matter-of-factly. “Both the Flare and the Runners would hunt you down if you stayed. Since you guys both got into the same university, it’ll be easier to hide out there.”

“I’m coming with,” Harriet says cheerfully.

“Of course,” Sonya affirms. “We’re both coming with you.”

“How long have you guys been planning this?” Newt asks, completely astounded. “You’re eighteen years old.”

“Since she stabbed me,” Harriet deadpans.

Sonya groans. “Are you never going to let that go?”

“Nope.”

Sonya leans forward, pressing her lips to Harriet’s cheek.

“Okay, maybe,” Harriet mumbles.

“Okay, bye,” Newt says loudly, shutting the window to the front of the van.

Turning to look at Minho, he grins widely. “We did it.”

\----------

“We did it!” Minho called out triumphantly, skimming through both letters held side by side.

He turned to look at Newt, who was sitting next to him, eyes wide with excitement and joy.

“We did it! We got in! We can go to university!” Minho crowed out, yanking Newt into a great big hug.

“Yes!” Newt yelled, pumping his fist in the air.

Minho looked at Newt, at how close they were, at how beautiful Newt looked in this classroom, with the setting sun shining on his golden locks of hair. He opened his mouth, words on the tip of his tongue. “Newt, I—”

_I like you. I really, really like you. I might even love you. I think I’ve loved you for a long time now._

He’d thought about every single possible way he could tell Newt all of that, and he finally had an opportunity and yet—he couldn’t bring himself to utter the words, because there was no way in hell Newt could possibly return his feelings.

So he shut his mouth, and let go.

“Yeah?” Newt asks, completely unaware.

“No, I was just going to say that… I can’t wait to go,” Minho finished lamely.

“Together,” Newt said, grinning.

“Together,” Minho echoed.

\----------

“I can’t believe we get to go to university together,” Newt says, bouncing into the seat next to Minho. “I mean, the Runners, the Flare, the guns, the death… what happened this morning seems like it happened a lifetime ago.”

“Yeah,” Minho replies, mind preoccupied with something. “Hey, Newt, I—”

He stops short, yet again. But then he remembers how he almost died not an hour ago, and how in comparison this is—nope. This is definitely ten times as terrifying. He stares at the wall in front of him, swallows, and continues.

“Newt, I like you. I’ve liked you for a really long time now,” he says, and begins rambling nervously. “Since I fought those guys, since you gave me that shitty Avatar plaster, since we studied together for long, shitty hours in the library, since you patched me up after every fight. I love you and your ridiculous face and your ridiculous laugh and your really smart brain and your heart and your spirit even if you have no sense of self-preservation and you, you, I love—”

“Minho.”

Minho turns to look at Newt, and brown eyes meet brown eyes.

Newt is beaming, from ear to ear, and he reaches out a hand to the back of Minho’s neck, and touches his forehead to Minho’s. “Can I kiss you?” He whispers.

“Yeah,” Minho says, brain short-circuiting.

Newt brings their lips together, and Minho’s brain _really_ frizzes out. First kisses are never perfect, and this one is mostly definitely not, because they are both smiling far too much to kiss properly, but it most definitely is, because it is Newt, and it is Minho, and they are _together_.

\----------

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys!!! hope you enjoyed reading it, and if you liked this, please, please like and comment if you can!! (or even if u didn't) i'd really appreciate it some feedback!!! thank you so much for reading till the end. i'm pretty sure this is the longest thing i've written so far and it's nearly 3am so forgive me if there are any mistakes and let me know pls but anyway thank you for reading this i love u guys  
> and im on tumblr so if u want my url pls comment and come yell about minewt with me!!!  
> minhoismazerunner gave me this prompt on the minewt discord and i've finally finished it after a billion years!!!! thank you for the prompt i loved writing it!!! also big shoutout to everyone on the minewt discord i love y'all u keep the minewt love alive  
> also the death cure is out (but i haven't watched tst and tdc yet oops) and the fans returning was a huge motivation to finish this so i love y'all as well  
> ((also forgive me for gang names and very incorrect portrayal of gangs/the mafia))


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